Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 66 posts

Re: Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner

#31

Post by ctchocula »

The Power Broker - the story of how an idealist turned into Darth Vader

The Years of Lyndon Johnson - the story of how LBJ rigged the 1948 election for Senate and rose to power

Here's an excerpt from an interview with the author of both books:

> During all these years I did come to understand stuff about power that I wanted people to know. You read in every textbook that cliché: Power corrupts. In my opinion, I’ve learned that power does not always corrupt. Power can cleanse. When you’re climbing to get power, you have to use whatever methods are necessary, and you have to conceal your aims. Because if people knew your aims, it might make them not want to give you power. Prime example: the southern senators who raised Lyndon Johnson up in the Senate. They did that because he had made them believe that he felt the same way they did about black people and segregation. But then when you get power, you can do what you want. So power reveals. Do I want people to know that? Yes.

Re: Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner

#32

Post by fsloth »

jkeat wrote: post #26
dkural wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His Leonardo biography is mediocre at best. It may read smoothly but he lacks a good grasp of the subject matter. Instead, Leonardo is like an earlier Steve Jobs of some kind.

I've enjoyed some of Walter Isaacson's books but always worried an internet-intellectual would roast me for that. I think those biographies are more pop than his fans like to think and more academic than his detractors might imagine.

I don't think there is anything wrong in 'pop' when the work is intended to be popular. I expect the biographer to verify her sources but as a reader I'm not going to go out (generally) to verify them.

Things that happened, happened. Most of all when reading popular biographies I want to be introduced to real things that happened, and if some of that draws my interest, I can then dig in to more academic sources.

The popular biographies offer the '100 feet' view over their subject and the society in which they lived in, and should not be disparaged if they succeed in doing that in a readable and entertaining manner.

Re: Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner

#34

Post by elliekelly »

The Fish Who Ate The Whale. If you think Bezos and Zuckerberg are cunning & determined entrepreneurs Sam the Banana Man will blow your mind.

To give you a taste: His opponents (a large, well-funded and established competitor) stymied his attempt to get permission to build a bridge across a river. Undeterred, Sam built two piers. One from each side of the river. They told him he couldn’t build a bridge. No one ever told him he couldn’t build piers.

He was probably too good at what he set out to do but he built an empire that still exists today out of bananas that were destined for garbage.

Re: Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner

#35

Post by schuetze »

As a meta-recommendation, I suggest checking out Five Books [1]. It's a website dedicated to bringing in experts and having them suggest five books that best represent their given fields. The archive of interviews on Five Books covers all the topics listed above and more.

[1] https://fivebooks.com/

Re: Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner

#36

Post by estsauver »

ctchocula wrote: post #31

The Power Broker - the story of how an idealist turned into Darth Vader The Years of Lyndon Johnson - the story of how LBJ rigged the 1948 election for Senate and rose to power Here's an excerpt from an interview with the author of both books: > During all these years I did come to understand stuff about power that I wanted people to know. You read in every textbook that cliché: Power corrupts. In my opinion, I’ve le…

I really love the Robert Caro LBJ series. I'm on the second one now and they're hard to put down.

(I also think it's one of the best descriptions of why the romanticized simple life of a subsistence farmer misses how incredibly hard their lives are. There'a a ~4 page section describing what life was like for farmers in Hill country in E. Texas before electrification, and it's so incredibly similar to how our farmers live now. )

Re: Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner

#37

Post by suchoudh »

My Experiments with Truth - Mahatma Ghandhi Autobiography of a Yogi - Beyond the last blue mountain - RM Lala (on JRD Tata) The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin O Manas ke Hans (Hindi biography of Ramkrishna Paramhans who was the guru of Shri Vivekanand) Narendra Modi - nilanjan mukhopadhyay Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel - kaushal goyal Steve Jobs - Issacson

(While writing i realized that since last one year my outlook towards reading has shifted to politics like anything)

Re: Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner

#39

Post by marcelluspye »

ctchocula wrote: post #31

The Power Broker - the story of how an idealist turned into Darth Vader The Years of Lyndon Johnson - the story of how LBJ rigged the 1948 election for Senate and rose to power Here's an excerpt from an interview with the author of both books: > During all these years I did come to understand stuff about power that I wanted people to know. You read in every textbook that cliché: Power corrupts. In my opinion, I’ve le…

I just read about 70% of The Power Broker before having to return it to the library - what a book. I was surprised at how easy it was to read something so long, with often pretty banal subject matter. Reading it reminded me of that piece of advice often given to college freshmen about finding the best professor on campus and taking their classes: even if you're totally uninterested in the subject at the start, you'll get drawn in by the professor's enthusiasm and ability.
Post reply on HN